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The US Army The Army needed to repair an older piece of equipment. The specialist who researched the problem found that an Adaptec SCSI card had gone bad and needed to be replaced. Unfortunately this card was no longer manufactured and had disappeared from regular supply channels. The recommendation from the specialist was that the equipment would have to be replaced, but at a cost of about $30,000 the Army started looking for an alternative and contacted CUETECH. Through our channels we were able to find the exact version of the failed Adaptec card. It was in new condition and the cost was $400. Once installed the equipment operated flawlessly and saved the Army over $29,000 and a great deal of lost time.
Working with Intergraph Corporation, leading global provider of engineering and geospatial software, and the US Navy, CUETECH was able to help them overcome a problem with an on-board system that required an array of CD-Rom drives. As the drives were aging spares were becoming increasingly difficult to find and so Intergraph asked CUETECH to help them find spares. Even with our vast network of suppliers we could only source small quantities and so we suggested to the Navy and Intergraph that a search for a replacement product should be started immediately. They concurred and asked CUETECH to research the problem and find the replacement. Taking into account the space limitations on the boat and the conditions the boat would have to endure at sea, we quickly determined that there would be a problem installing the new generation of CD drives that required the CD to be placed in a tray for loading. To make room for the tray to open, it would have to open into the narrow galley way which was totally unacceptable and, with heavy seas, trying to place the CD into the tray and have it stay there was not practical. The CD players we selected and that were accepted by the Navy and Intergraph were slot-load devices that could be stacked horizontally and mounted vertically, i.e. with the “slot” on top.
When the US Army was reviewing the status of their mission critical systems they determined that they needed a backup for an aging DEC system. The system, however, was no longer available due to its age and so they asked their contractor, Northrop Grumman, to help them find a solution. Northrop’s solution was to obtain a backup part for every component in the system, but the age of the system meant that their buyers were having trouble obtaining these parts through their regular channels and it was at this point that they contacted CUETECH. From our past association with Northrop, they knew that finding obsolete and hard-to-find parts was our specialty and rather than spend their time in unfamiliar territory trying to obtain the parts themselves, they asked us for our assistance. Accepting the challenge, we inventoried every part system. We went down to the board level to determine firmware and revision levels of the server components, monitors, storage devices and network equipment and we documented every cable and connector. With this information and utilizing our network of suppliers and resellers, we were able to obtain and ship every component and peripheral required
The US Navy deploys high voltage, on-ship, storage devices in long distance configurations, i.e. because of space limitations on the boat, the storage devices had to be located a distance from the server and thus required a unique SCSI connectivity solution. When the original storage vendor ended production of the long distance solution, the Navy needed several hundred replacement drives and spares. The unique configuration meant that the drives specifications had to be matched exactly so as to be compatible with the SCSI controller cards, but current technology was incompatible and so another solution had to be sought by the Navy. The original storage vendor referred the US Navy to CUETECH to find, source and deliver the out of production drives. Using our proprietary database containing over 15 years of high technology sourcing paths, we quickly located replacement drives, and our technicians confirmed that the firmware and operating system elements were 100% compatible. We immediately shipped the replacement drives and a number of spare drives directly to the Navy.
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